My heroes: Ryan Dancey and Peter Adkison

[Buttercup]

My point is that I now realize just how precious my html SRD is. I can legally burn copies for people who don't have a PHB. I can legally cut and paste from it to make my own player's handbook to distribute to my players. For free. If I want to publish my wacky house rules, I can do that pretty darn easily. Tonight, I finally understand just what Ryan and Peter gave us.

It was crazy, what they did. Obviously Hasbro and WotC think it wasn't a great business move, and I know it's true.

If Hasbro goes insane tomorrow and decides to close up shop at WotC and mothball the D&D brand forever, we still have our game. If, over the years, the new editions of D&D that will keep rolling out morph into something none of us can recognize at all, we still have our game.

So again I say, thanks guys.

 

[Buttercup]

The OGL was one of the most amazing things to come about in gaming that I can think of. Ryan Dancey did a very good thing, there. Unfortunately, I just wish it had been done with a system that I enjoyed playing rather than 3E. I'd rather have my prostate examined with a spatula than play it. 4E I mostly really like, but the license they came out with turns me off in a big way.

I should just go back to Rolemaster and hope DnD dies so that someone who knows what they're doing takes over.

Well, sweetie, I won't even care if you get your wish, because I have my SRD and no one can ever take it from me!

 

[JohnRTroy]

Yeah, I'm happy about it to, and I thank them.

I don't really care for what they did with 4e. From a business standpoint, I don't like the OGL from a creator's standpoint. But as a fan of the product, I do like that they gave us a way to keep playing in case the company went astray.

It's too bad Peter left the company so soon.

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

Seems to me that most publishers can still release pretty much the same products they always could.

No Midnight. No Grim Tales. No Spycraft.

Total fail.

 

[Psion]

My point is that I now realize just how precious my html SRD is. I can legally burn copies for people who don't have a PHB. I can legally cut and paste from it to make my own player's handbook to distribute to my players. For free. If I want to publish my wacky house rules, I can do that pretty darn easily. Tonight, I finally understand just what Ryan and Peter gave us.

It was crazy, what they did. Obviously Hasbro and WotC think it wasn't a great business move, and I know it's true.

If Hasbro goes insane tomorrow and decides to close up shop at WotC and mothball the D&D brand forever, we still have our game. If, over the years, the new editions of D&D that will keep rolling out morph into something none of us can recognize at all, we still have our game.

So again I say, thanks guys.

Well put.

Of course I've felt this way for a long time.

Except for the poison pill bit, there's really not anything that abnormal about GSL when it comes to IP licenses. In fact, you might call it generous; many companies pay for those sorts of rights.

But still, the "norm" for IP these days does serve as a reminder to how great a thing the OGL and SRD are. In the big scheme of things, it's a small thing, really. Just a little legal protection for a simple pastime in a time of litigiousness. But it lets me enjoy my pastime in peace.

So I'll join the voices. Thank you.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

Yes thank the both of you. You created the edition that brought me back to D&D, and the license that ended the old TSR C&D letter days. You've given us a system that we can use freely pretty much forever and modify as we wish. You created a great thing for the hobby. Seeing the GSL just drives home how far things have fallen from your intent.

 

[RangerWickett]

I'd rather have my prostate examined with a spatula than play it.

I think I'd pick the gaming session over the metal implement in my "place where metal implements shouldn't go".

Rodrigo, Midnight could work fine if you, well, threw out all the existing classes and races and made your own. Grim Tales, sure, you're right; you can't open up 4e's guts and play with the piping. But for both it and Spycraft, you can just make a new game that accomplishes what you want.

Sure, the mechanics would be different, but the publishers could have released games that accomplished the same thing without the OGL. I won't deny that having the OGL encouraged a lot of people to jump into the pool, but I'm not sure we're really going to lose a lot.

I mean seriously, 4e and Grim Tales are pretty much opposite ends of the spectrum, thematically.

 

[RangerWickett]

Oh, and don't let my defense of the GSL imply that I don't also love what Dancey and Adksion did with the OGL. They should be remembered like founding fathers.

 

[BryonD]

I mean seriously, 4e and Grim Tales are pretty much opposite ends of the spectrum, thematically.

The lad speaks much truth.

 

[Voadam]

I'm feeling the love as well.

Irrevocable. No at will termination clause.

Cut and paste free easy to reference D&D rules.

No requirement to stop producing other older RPG products.

Great stuff available to support it.

And I enjoy and play the system.